Obama Answers Clinton's 'Debate' Ad

The negative exchange may be the first on-air clash between the two Democratic frontrunners. But it is a decidedly gentle tussle.

Clinton's ad knocked Obama for declining to debate him in the state. His response, "After 18 debates, with two more coming, Hillary says Barack Obama is ducking debates?
It's the same old politics, of phony charges and false attacks."

"I didn't find [Clinton's ad] to be the most effective negative ad I've seen," said Ken Goldstein, a University of Wisconsin professor who monitors political commercials. "But she needed to do it."

Why? Goldstein said that while Clinton is already well known to Wisconsin voters, Obama is still introducing himself. "She needs to define Barack Obama."

And what does Obama need to do? Respond quickly to negative attacks, Goldstein said. And with the spot the campaign made public today, that's what Obama plans to do.

Comments

Please join up with the Obama camp. This isn't about ego - its about the future of the party. Obama is growing the party leaps and bounds over anything we've seen since before Reagan. We are on the brink of a Democratic consensus for the first time in a long long time. Obama is the one to lead it. Hillary is an accomplished person due respect, but she can't build the consensus as he can. Please join up and help us get out of the 51% era of partisan warfare and lead us into the 65% era of consensus politics.

Obama is person for the job. Please give your support to Obama.

Posted by: Mo | February 14, 2008 4:53 PM

I find Clinton's negative ad as cheap trick to save her nomination, instead she should focus on differences and her positve side. Shame on you clinton !

I think with negative campaign in south carolina Mr.Clinton received a black eye, probably Ms.Clinton will receive one more in Wisconcin

Posted by: Desi | February 14, 2008 5:14 PM

Hillary is in trouble with WI and HI coming up before Ohio and Texas. Romney by asking his delegates to go McCain makes the Texas vote irrelevent giving their Republicans a chance to knock Clinton out of the race. With a Delay type Republican base, I expect them to pull this nasty trick. Obama may win enough delegates to get the nomination if Texas swings his way.

Posted by: Anonymous | February 14, 2008 8:59 PM

Historically, African-Americans have shown that they do not vote for a presidential candidate simply because s/he is African-American. If that were true, Shirley Chisholm, Jesse Jackson, Alan Keyes, and Al Sharpton would have done as well as Barack Obama has done when they ran for office. However, that's not the case.

Barack Obama has managed to confuse political pundits who have not yet conceived what's actually happening in America because their education hasn't taught them how to analyze a "movement." They are skilled at analyzing a "political campaign." Therefore, we have a "movement" versus a "political campaign." In America there has only been four movements since our existence: (1) When America declared its Independence from England; (2) When Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., unified the country to fight for Civil Rights; (3) When John F. Kennedy ran for president; and now, (4) Barack Obama. During each of these "movements" we have heard stories about the greatest orators in American history. Let's take a look at Patrick Henry who declared the American liberation movement:

In 1765 Henry was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses in Williamsburg. The same year, the British Parliament infuriated the colonies by passing the Stamp Act, a form of direct taxation. Henry led the fight against the act in the House of Burgesses and presented seven resolutions condemning it. The resolutions asserted that only the colonial legislatures could levy taxes on the colonies. In support of his resolutions, Henry warned, "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the Third ... may profit by their example." In answer to cries of treason from conservative members, Henry replied, "If this be treason, make the most of it." The resolutions started a chain reaction that deeply affected opinion in other colonies.

Next, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., gave the "I Have A Dream" speech during the Civil Rights movement:

"The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and They have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone."

. . .

"I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers."

Senator Barack Obama won the Alabama primary and I truly believe he is simply fulfilling the dream of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and will bring this entire Nation into the next chapter of American history: "The Promise Land."

President John F. Kennedy motivated this country with the following words that rang true for every American:

"It is not what your country can do for you, but what YOU can do for your country."

According to the great American Philosopher, Ralph Waldo Emerson, it was said:

"The spiritual is stronger than any material force, thoughts rule the world."

Historically, the person leading the "movement" has always been the victor. Hillary Clinton is running a political campaign that lays out unguaranteed "issues" while Barack Obama offers "hope" and concludes that "there is nothing false about hope." These words resonate with an American people who have been subjected to eight years of lying, stealing, and murder. Americans have felt powerless against its electorate until Barack Obama came along and said "this movement" doesn't start from the top down, it "begins from the bottom up." His message explicitly states that the new government will work for the people, not Corporate America.

Finally, I do not find it sad that Hillary Clinton is losing this election. After all, she is trying to kill the message of "hope." During the Civil Rights movement Whites/Blacks collectively would not allow anyone to kill "the dream." Patrick Henry put his life on the line when he vehemently spoke out against the tyranny of the British Parliament. As Barack Obama said: "We know the battle ahead will be long. But always remember that no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change" . . . "We have been told that we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics. It will only grow louder and more dissonant. We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We been warned against offering the people of this Nation false hope. But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false . . . about hope." I want CHANGE what about you?

Posted by: Edward Nelson | February 15, 2008 3:22 PM

Well played Obama.

Clinton is trying to take you off-message by going negative. If you go negative to, it takes the wind out of your Hope campaign. By responding with an "above the fray" message like this, you are doing exactly what you should be. Plus you have way more money than her so you can afford to respond and keep running positive advertisements. Awesome.

Posted by: Tetris | February 15, 2008 3:48 PM

Hillary--We have had enough of your war, NAFTA, GATT, and welfare reform...To name but a few. There is no possible way you can win. Have the decency to recognize Obama has beaten you. It's over.

Posted by: gmundenat | February 15, 2008 7:11 PM

Okay. Obaminations. Somebody's gotta do it.
THERE IS NO EASTER BUNNY. Grow up already. Who do you think is financing your hero's rock concert? Hello! The REPUBLICANS! (check out -thecityedition.com for all the big money republicans coughing up for Obama). Because HE CAN'T WIN IN NOVEMBER. He has no experience; no credentials.

I heard someone say recently that Obama lies every time he opens his mouth (he has now promised so many conflicting things it's hard to keep track). That's not quite true: He PALGAIRIZES every time he opens his mouth. Every time he releases anything substantive--(the economy, katrina relief) he stole it from Clinton. Not cool.

He tells people in Idaho he's not going to take away their guns--but he's supported gun control for 20 years! Doesn't take money from special interests? What was the $160K from Execlon (the nuclear giant)? A Valentine?

He has the most liberal voting record in the Senate (that is, of course, the 20% of the time he shows up to vote)--and somehow he's going to attract independents and moderates? Well, maybe so far--but NOT WHEN THEY FIND OUT WHO THEY'RE VOTING FOR!

He's a member of a RADICAL church in Chicago that just honored Louis Farrakhan (yeah, really--Louis Farrakhan--that amiable, peace-loving, change- making UNIFIER (nothing divisive about Louis Farrakhan) whose stated objective is to support Africa (not the US) and divest from Israel to aid their muslim brethren (check out their website if you don't believe me:Chicago Trinity United Church of Christ/mission.

Barack Obama (or 'Barry'--as he was known before he found Black Power') is not qualified to be President--as he himself acknowledged in 2004 (check out the most recent Vanity Fair)

Change? Another good lookin,' fast talkin' guy that needs a teleprompter to keep his facts straight...Sounds like more of the same to me. HILLARY '08

Posted by: spega | February 16, 2008 1:41 AM

Hillary again is being a negative Nelly. Why would she change the way she does business? What a wonderful response to her ad.

Out of desperation, she demanded a debate once a week. Obama agrees to 2 more debates beyond the 20 they had already had. You know that during those debates she will come out and not just attack, but attack with confusing innuendoes falsehoods.

She cannot now, nor ever, compete with Sen. Obama's ability to unify and bring our country together. The only unifying that she can do is within the Republican Party.

Posted by: CitizenXX | February 16, 2008 10:00 AM

I cannot believe this stranger has come out of nowhere and duped the American public with his flowery, lofty retoric- that they follow without question, like sheep. (to the slaughter). His machine has the weak-minded so pumped up that it is laughable. If you dare say one uncomplimentary thing, you are shouting down with screams of racist and bigot and called a spreader of lies and filth!! Even if you present facts that are indisputable- like his books and what he says in his speeches, they call you liar.
They refuse to believe. Absolutely amazing- and very, very frightening- the power behind this man.
He has the money of the black radicals and Muslim radicals behind him to put out a pristine resume, and to hide his Islamic past- and present.
They are working day and night to white wash him and to stop criticism. They are even scrubbing the net of detrimental material.
You who do not believe this information had best get your heads out of the sand and wake up to who this man is and just what his agenda might be.
Read his books. Go to YouTube and listen to his speeches. Educate yourselves

"God will destroy America by the hands of the Muslims....God will not give Japan or Europe the honor of bringing down the United States; this is an honor God will bestow upon Muslims." - Nation of Islam Leader Louis Farrakhan

According to a journalist's account, "Farrakhan called 'the white man' the 'anti-Christ' to rousing applause."

"White America got their wake-up call after 9-11. White America and the Western world came to realize people of color had not gone away, faded in the woodwork, or just disappeared as the Great White West kept on its merry way of ignoring black concerns." Jeremiah Wright (Obama's pastor and mentor)

"The Israelis have illegally occupied Palestinian territories for over 40 years now. Divestment has now hit the table again as a strategy to wake the business community and wake up Americans concerning the injustice and the racism under which the PALESTINIANS have lived because of Zionism." Jeremiah Wright. Obama's pastor.

From Dreams of My Father, " I FOUND A SOLACE IN NURSING A PERVASISVE SENSE OF GRIEVANCE AND ANIMOSITY AGAINST MY MOTHER'S RACE". Barack Hussein Obama

From 'Dreams of my Father', "The emotion between the races could never be pure, even love was tarnished by the desire to find in the other some element that was missing in ourselves. Whether we sought out our demons or salvation, the other race (WHITE) would always remain just that: menacing, alien, and apart." Barack Hussein Obama

From Dreams Of My Father: "That hate hadn't gone away," he wrote, BLAMING "WHITE PEOPLE -- some CRUEL, some IGNORANT, sometimes a single face, sometimes just a faceless image of a system claiming power over our lives." Barack Hussein Obama

From 'Dreams Of My Father', "There were enough of us on campus to constitute a tribe, and when it came to hanging out many of us chose to function like a tribe, staying close together, traveling in packs," he wrote. "It remained necessary to prove which side you were on,to show your LOYALTY TO THE BLACK MASSES, TO STRIKE OUT and name names" Barack Hussein Obama

Obama's campaign quickly issued a statement "Senator Obama is proud of his pastor and his church."

I've read the books...you're quoting vastly out of context. In those passages you quote, he's describing his feelings in his youth and adolescence as a person of color, and the discrimination he experienced. Now quote where he describes growing past these feelings as he matures, and comes to realize that racism/hatred is nonproductive.

I'm not thrilled with his connection, however distant, with Louis Ferrakhan, either. But that has to do with his(Farrakhan's) blatant racism and hate-mongering, not his Muslim-ness. Obama's not a muslim...I doubt that he's a profoundly sincere christian, either. But thanks to the religious right's stranglehold on politics in recent years, no one can get elected dogcatcher without proclaiming his or her "faith" loudly and often.

You can alarm the ignorant and uneducated with this kind of lying smear...and those too lazy to do their own reading. But those folks are usually going to vote republican anyway. I love to read this kind of stuff on a thread containing complaints about Obama's supporters being so nasty to Hillary, telling lies about her, etc. Yeah, right. WE'RE the lying smear-mongers.

If Hillary wins the nomination fair and square, I'll vote for her in November. If she steals it by getting the "ghost delegates" from MI and FL seated without a re-do, I'll vote for McCain. Got nothing to do with hate for Hillary. Just had enough of election-stealing tactics. I don't completely trust McCain, but he's more honest than Hillary, and he can't possibly be any more power-hungry.

A man named Larry Sinclair posted a video to YouTube claiming to have used cocaine and engaged in a gay sexual act with Obama when Obama was a state legislator in 1999.

In the video, Sinclair claims he and Obama met on two separate occasions, that Obama used crack cocaine and that Sinclair performed an oral sexual act on Obama both evenings.

Now Obama and company are quickly trying to quiet this man, but Sinclair has filed a federal lawsuit. Sinclair filed suit against Obama and his campaign guru David Axelrod in Minnesota district court for allegedly attempting to abridge Sinclair's right to free speech, and for waging an intimidation campaign against him.

America wants to know: where's the media coverage on this???? We deserve to hear the truth!

Posted by: Jack | February 17, 2008 9:46 PM

Good grief - now they really ARE getting desperate. This Sinclair claim is straight out of Primary Colors, isn't it? Still, the only ones who'll believe it wouldn't be Obama supporters anyway.

Posted by: Mark O | February 18, 2008 10:42 AM

I am 45 years old.

I have never met john Kennedy.

But, I was very a girl baby.

When he got shot in Texas.

You see when I was growing up.

The white people disliked.

The black people alot.

But, things has changed.

And what Mr. Obama.

Did, was down right rude.

And dispectful.

You see Mr. King.

Did't put anyone down.

In matter fact,

I bet you if he was .

Still alive today.

He would say.

We are brothers and sisters.

No matter what race we're.

I have 2 adopted cousins.

And they are not white.

My other famliy.

married people from Cuda.

And also, My other cousin.

Married a spanish girl.

She by the way is a real.

witch.

And I think that Obama.

Is a person.

Who needs to.

Wake and smell.

The java.

Mr. Obama.

Who do think is.

Still in the land of oz.

Sincerely Yours,

not a supporter

Posted by: brendar | February 19, 2008 9:10 PM

Obama's efforts to connect to the Republican Party, specifically Bush, and Dick Chaney, of the Halliburton Company, dates back to the Presidents Grandfather, Prescott Bush, and indeed Chaney was once an executive officer of Halliburton.

The American military pounds Iraq with Artillary, bombs, and the like, destroying large sections of cities, and infra-structures, then Halliburton comes in to rebuild. Halliburton and Halliburton associated companies have raked in ten's of billions.

Obama is just like the BIG HALIBURTAN. Haliburton has contracted to build detention centers in the U.S. similiar to the one in Quantanammo Bay, Cuba. Halliburton does nothing to earn the Two Dollars for each meal an American Serviceman in Iraq eats.

Halliburton was scheduled to take control of the Dubai Ports in The United Arab Emiirate. The deal was canceled when Bush was unable to affect the transfer of the American Ports.

Now we see what some might suspect as similiar financial escapading from the Democrats.

Two years ago, Iraq's Ministry of Electricity gave a $50 million contract to a start-up security company - Companion- owned by now-indicted businessman (TONY REZKO) Tony Rezko and a onetime Chicago cop, Daniel T. Frawley, to train Iraqi power-plant guards in the United States. An Iraqi leadership change left the deal in limbo. Now the company, Companion Security, is working to revive its contract.
Involved along with Antoin "Tony" Rezco, long time friend and neighbor of Democratic Presidential hopeful Barack Obama, and former cop Daniel T. Frawley, is Aiham Alsammarae. Alsammarae was accused of financial corruption by Iraqi authorities and jailed in Iraq last year before escaping and returning here.

LIKE FATHER LIKE SON --
Obama should be vetted and disclose his connection to the criminal money generating underworld. Besides, his connections to the REZCO MAFIA types, his up-coming tax fraud charges -- Obama needs to disclose why he is a MUSLIM "PATWANG-FWEEE" and stop suppoting our intervention in IRAQ. It's time to introduce this false, fake Xerox - X box Obama and invite the self-indicting thief plagiarizing pipsqueke "GLORK" Xerox - X box to meet the Buffalo "GAZOWNT-GAZIKKA" Police Department Buffalo Creek. He is MAD!!! --

OBAM YOUR NO JFK --
"GLORK" Obama looks like Alfred E. Newman: "Tales Calculated To Drive You." He is a MUSLIM "Glork" He's MAD!!! Alfred E. Neuman is the fictional mascot of Mad. The face had drifted through American pictography for decades before being claimed by Mad editor Harvey Kurtzman after he spotted it on the bulletin board in the office of Ballantine Books editor Bernard Shir-Cliff, later a contributor to various magazines created by Kurtzman.
Obama needs to disclose why he is a MUSLIM "PATWANG-FWEEE" and stop suppoting our intervention in IRAQ. It's time to introduce this false, fake "GLORK" Xerox - X box Obama and invite the self-indicting thief plagiarizing pipsqueke Xerox - X box to meet the Buffalo "GAZOWNT-GAZIKKA" Police Department Buffalo Creek.http://www.halliburtonwatch.org/

Posted by: jreno | February 26, 2008 2:42 AM

dear Mo, i find it offensive that Obama people always insist Hillary supporters give up. The campaign was not won, in fact the nation is about equally divided. What about Obama giving up? Oh right, men insist the woman leave the game as usual.

Im so insulted and have been from the begining by the tone of this so much so i can now say i will not vote obama